Nutrition - Fatigue - Dietary Recommendations

One theory holds that a nutritional deficiency may be a contributing factor causing CFS, so it's important to maintain a healthy diet. Diet can be used beneficially to strengthen the ailing immune system of people suffering from chronic fatigue. It is now recognized that a well-balanced diet should be part of the treatment for all chronic illnesses. Chronic fatigue syndrome is not primarily a dietary disorder. But as in other debilitating illnesses, people suffering from CFS fail to consume a nutritious diet. This leads to dietary related complications.

The following items are important if you are suffering from CFS:

Avoid sugar and sweets. Sweet foods cause dramatic fluctuations in blood-glucose levels, and unstable blood-sugar levels cause fatigue. If sweetener is used at all, choose a natural sweetener like honey, which contains the vitamins needed to digest it. Frequent, small meals help keep blood- sugar levels stable.

Diet is crucial to building the immune system and conquering CFS. Avoid foods low in nutrients and high in sugar and fat. Instead, eat high-nutrient, high-protein, complex carbohydrate foods such as vegetables, grains, beans, fish, and poultry.

Eliminate all allergic foods. If you are highly allergic, the rotate the non-allergenic foods. Drink eight to ten glasses of pure water and vegetable or fruit juices daily to flush out toxins.

Eat raw fruits and vegetables, whole grains and unroasted nuts and seeds. Raw fruits and vegetables and whole grains provide fiber. Fiber alleviates constipation, a factor in fatigue. Apples, oatmeal and oat bran are particularly beneficial because the fiber they contain is water-soluble and binds and eliminates toxins. Unrefined, cold-pressed nut and seed oils and cold-water fish provide essential fatty acids which help boost the immune system.

Flaxseed oil is an essential fatty acid that could help people with CFS. Take up to two teaspoons a day, along with a magnesium supplement of 400 milligrams. Flaxseed oil is available in liquid and capsule form.

Sea greens, such as spirulina and blue-green algae, contain many trace minerals that are missing in the normal diet.

Sixty percent of people suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome also suffer from candidiasis. Avoid all forms of sugar, including milk products (lactose), fruit, caffeine, alcohol, and refined carbohydrates (white flour, white rice). Eat plain, unsweetened yogurt or drink kefir daily to provide friendly bacteria which inhibit the growth of candida yeast. Take a good basic multivitamin/mineral supplement with adequate amounts of trace minerals. Garlic and nutritional yeast are effective against intestinal parasites, another factor relating to chronic fatigue syndrome.